Parent reaches out through YouTube

I don’t know how to react when a distressed parent reaches out. Should I be happy or sad.... as it hurts still to know that there is a child who will begin a journey I already am on and happy that in this big world they found me for a support that I can extend. It’s always a journey I relive each time I have a new parent who reaches out. Today was just like that! A mum reaches out just as I finished lunch and settled down to read on a cold day. I planned to snuggle in with my online reading. A lady messaged on messenger and for some odd reason I quickly respond. Her month old baby is deaf and she is desperate for help. Before I ask her for details I asked how she knows about me. Her response gave me a bit of comfort as I wonder at times if all my online work is of any help to anyone. She was looking for deafness on YouTube and found our videos!! She called up and we spoke for over 2 hours! I was pleasantly surprised to know that she has nearly seen every video I have put on YouTube since the last month!! Each time I told her about a technique or incident ....she said she saw it and she completed what I had to say!! I was appalled to say the least!! She has been in various support groups and updated herself in the last one month through every way and she was inspired and motivated by our story so much so that she was ready to fly to Jakarta to meet me!! I am humbled and yet so happy that she has found ma’am to guide her through her videos and I can help her till she needs us! Just a month of being a mum has been so difficult and yet this mum is brave to fight odds for her baby! I feel so positive about this family and I pray and hope that we are able to give her that hope and direction in this world till she learns her way, gets steady and finds her wings to fly like many other mums. As I turned ready eyed at a few moments...I recalled my journey and felt grateful for all that I updated online so that some desperate mother somewhere can find help just the way I did 14 years ago! Each of these kids has been special and each mother taught me and motivated me to never stop writing and sharing my journey through their ways. She is in a place and country where she has all the support imaginable and all facilities....yet she found our journey worth listening to. What more can I say.....thank you Ma Alaka Hudlikar. Here is to you!! There is no mentor like you anywhere in the world. I am blessed and a chosen one to be your student.  

Girls are beautiful

Sunshine happiness

One of the most profound statement made my Prisha today. She is studying about population in her school. I told her about female infanticide and she was pretty shaken and shocked to hear about it. She said that's really mean thing to do. Why should people do that. We discussed it in the Indian context. She was quiet. I then realized ,she being a thinker and a deep person. would be a bit sad inside. I then told her how it's changing and not everyone does that. I moved on to telling her how I prayed day in and out for years for a little baby girl with curls and dimples. And when she did come in we were rejoicing and so thrilled. She was so touched, went awwwwww and we hugged tight. It just felt so right.

She moved on to study. At the dinner table she again brought up the topic. Suddenly she says.... " hey why should they kill the girls! If girls are not there how would babies be born!! Boys can't give birth and girls are so lovely!! 

Just brought a smile on my face. She is our bright sunshine and blessed to hear her chatter and thoughts. Girls indeed are beautiful and hold a whole life in them. They give life and nurture and show the world what real pure love is all about. Girls make the world beautiful. She makes ours beautiful and complete.

A preteen to be tested for hearing loss

    They say... Touch one life at a time and make a difference however small. Help someone, change a life however difficult it might be. That's what I am trying today. 

    12 year old had speech issues. A doctor grandma, an involved mother yet they couldn't figure out why the little girl cannot speak well and looks at the face. They felt the child didn't care and ignores what they speak. Not realizing the child isn't hearing!

    Grandma heard me and asked for help. Met the mother and gave her all the signs of deafness which she confirmed now with testing. Influencing a preteen won't be easy. Suddenly to ask her to wear hearing aids will be a challenge of sorts. It's taken me 4 months to get them here and hoping today would be a day when I can assure the child that nothing is lost. Having mild to moderate hearing loss, she speaks broken English , misses out conversation and has plenty of issues. My heart reaches out, skips a beat and can't wait to see one Chinese child fitted into the hearing world.

Small difference in accent

Prisha has just made out a small difference in a word. How we think it's not possible with the hearing impaired. I felt thrilled and she found it so amusing and couldn't stop laughing ! She is my little wonder.Water is that word that makes her giggle. Small discoveries.

A touching advertisement

Most touching advertisement. This is for all those kids who are ashamed of their deaf parents. Despite their disability, they want the best for their hearing kids. They work harder so that they can provide for them,they love them unconditionally ...so why are some kids ashamed to be born to them. I have known a few cases and so I thought it appropriate to share.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZMX6H6YY1M&feature=related

A turning point

       Well I was away for a long time.Just could not get myself to write as we had a sad event in our lives.Specially for Prisha it was a very difficult thing to cope with.I had to explain things to her which she had no clue of  and I too found it difficult to combine emotion with language.
       Prisha lost her paternal grand father on 15th June.Dadu was a big thing in her life.He had seen the time when she was about to come on this planet and had been living near us for the last 6.5 yrs of her life.He loved little girls.All the girls in our family were pampered by him.But Prisha being the youngest, took all importance.Then when she was detected for deafness,he became all the more protective for her. When I was firm with her during her speech development initial years, he was very upset.He spoilt her with colours, papers and all kinds of stationery as she loved the paper shop.If she needed somethings, she turned to him and looked with such a look in her eyes, his heart would bleed and for sure she would get it. She could get away with murder with him around.And now suddenly we heard that he passed away was very shocking to us all.
      We moved to Germany as my husband had been living alone for 3 years and we finally decided that Germany would do good to kids as the whole family would be together.I too was finding it tough to live alone with the kids.He was very attached to Prisha and she was one of reasons for him to be happy.She loved him, put balm on his knees when they pained, gave him the stick when he wanted to walk, held his hand if he wanted to get up and walk, sometimes she mothered him.Her going depressed him further as he was not a very social person.He loved to be at home with his near and dear ones.He had various health issues for the last 40 yrs.Within 5 weeks we heard that he passed away.We all rushed to India.I did not know what to tell Prisha.She used to miss them so much and used to keep telling him that she would meet him in December and he should look after himself.And now, I was left to think as to what should I tell her with her limited language about death.I told her dadu was unwell and we have to go back.She was so happy and she kept a box of chocolates  (that she got from someone), in her bag for him.I was torn inside.
      She kept asking me on the way why we were sad and crying.On reaching home, she was puzzled to see her grandma at home as she could not believe that dadu was alone in the hospital.The next day I thought it was too traumatic for her to see his body and so I left her with a friend.Inside of me I was torn between the choice.They loved eachother so much, both deserved to see each other the last time. Plus there would never be a connection about his leaving suddenly.the physical aspect is required to connect with that new concept for her of death.I could not deprive her of it and one day she might just question me on this.I decided to call her.I held her little hands, not knowing her reactions.I told her that dadu was not well and he was missing his parents a lot and so he is going into the clouds to be with them.She knew something was up and so kept nodding and listenning. he had told her once that when he is very old, he would go into the clouds and so I built the whole thing around that.She said after he meets them , he would come back to her.
      When she saw him, she just kept looking and I was looking for some reaction.She sat on the sofa with pursed lips.Suddenly she cried so loudly that everybody in the room turned with horror.She started to cry uncontrollably and people looked at me with disgust but I did what I thought was best.Everybody was upset that I could allow such a small kid to go through the pain.She saw the whole procedure and she saw him go.Later in the afternoon ,she asked me when he would be back.When I told her he had to be with his parents,she said he told her once that his mummy did not want to stay with him and so she went to the clouds and now too his mummy would not want him and send him back.I held back my tears.She has been since then talking to the clouds, talking to his photo.She played house and cooked pasta and fed his picture.She tickled his picture and kept talking to him as if he was around.She would enter the house and say "Hi Dadu" and behave as if he was around.But it was her way of trying to look normal.next day she told me that his mummy would say I don't want you, Prisha needs you and so he would come out of the cloud, sit in a hot air balloon,come down on a beach, sit in the ambulance and dad would get him back home. I was amazed at her imagination.
      On the way back to germany she looked in the clouds for him.Said there were no houses.I said he slept on the clouds.She now has started to associate white hair with going into the clouds.She gets upset when she sees a couple of white hair creeping out in my black hair.She says "your hair would always be black mumma".She says, we would all one day have white hair and go in the cloud and I would shout at dadu for going there.She keeps telling me that one day he would return to her.His mummy would send him back.When she was sick with viral for 8 days before coming back to germany, she talked to him.She told him that " now since you are in the clouds closer to God, tell him to cure me and to take my terrible headache away.I want to be all right".Every night  before sleeping she would pray to her dadu to make sure she is well again.
        I love the way she has made her adjustments through her own thought processes. We feel that kids are too small and would not understand.But we underestimate their strength.They are stronger than us and know how to take care of us and also older people.I am very glad that I let her see how her grandpa left.Once she grows up she would always be glad I did what I did.She would connect with this concept of death and I do not have to make more stories. As she matures I would clear her concept further and I am sure she would always feel closer to her loving dadu. Dadu I am sure, sitting in the clouds must be hearing everything she does and says and is now her guiding light and her "guardian angel" looking after her from there. I don't have to worry, he would make sure my little adorable girl turns out into a fine human being and her life is going to be just fine.I am glad also that I talked about it and their was a lot of new language and new words and every action we saw was verbalized.

A chat with a teacher/mother of the deaf

Today I decided to finally make that call to the mother of 2 deaf girls who are in their late 30's.The mother had gone through a lot as she was not fortunate to get the help that is available now.She educated herself in the field and somehow managed to get her girls married and they are communicating in half developed language but mainly use signs as the language is too limited.I asked her opinions on this and she too said sign is now recognised as the language of the deaf only if they are not able to develop language for reasons like late detection, inadequate hearing aids, not good speech therapy and above it parent's {read mother's} hard work.She said that people who have had early intervention and have undergone AVT like me and mothers have put in untiring hours of work with the child to develop speech and language and made sure the child is leading a normal life , does not need to learn signs. I put in a point to it- if i am more fluent in my mother tongue and not in English, the moment I meet a person who has the same issue , we would shift to our mother tongue.So like that, a child who is deaf and is brought up in AVT, and also learns signs, given a choice , he would shift to signs where he comes across a deaf signing child. But if he does not know signs and is only oral, he would react the same way to deaf signing person as a normal person would to the deaf person.If speech is not developed even after a lot of efforts, due to what ever reasons, sign language is the best way of communicating.My mind was clear about it but I felt it is always better to know about it from people who are into the field and are exposed to both kinds of methods.The lady has been a very dedicated person in this field and follows a middle path. If detected early, hearing aids put, she advises them to auditory verbal , but if detected late or language is not able to be developed, advises signs.These are people , who you know are leading us onto a right track.

Heart , talk to mumma

Prisha is on the latest fad of hearts.Actually this is there for a while now.All her pictures and paintings need to have all kinds and sizes of hearts.It is very cute , I would like to admit, as I go back to the time in college when hearts and smileys seem to rule my corner in the hostel. It has come pretty quick for her , a typical girlish thing. The hearts are there on the chef's coat , the jokers dress, the houses she draws, the mugs, the writings etc are incomplete without a couple of hearts thrown in.Her flowers are always with smiling faces and I realise that her paintings always portray her sense of being, which is very happy.She understands that she has a disability and cannot hear without the aids, has immense pain with boils in her ear still there, now her nose and the upper palate too is paining, but the moment I ask her to draw, she is at it and she forgets her pain.My husband and i were discussing the other day, how she has got so much life in her. She keeps my home alive with her fights with the big bro, her melodramas,her singing,her hugs and kisses which she is very generous with, and her "i love you"s keep me pepped up too.I am so glad she came into my life and then in spite of all the rough rides with her hearing impairment journey, life became easier to live once Alaka teacher came into our life and Prisha started to talk. I get those lumps even now thinking about our journey.It was a tough ride with ma'am hudlikar.She is very tough but when I see the results, I feel the struggle was worth it. The other day we were in Ikea in Vienna, I saw a couple using sign language, my eyes welled up and I shuddered to think that had it not been for Alaka ma'am our world too would have been so silent, we would have missed all the non stop chatter, the constant chatter that is full of jest, laughter, provoking [her big bro only] ,singing[ she makes these funny songs on her own] and that life would have been full of "why me". Today when I talk to a few mothers who are just starting out , my heart goes out to thm and I wish I could help them out with all the lessons I am able to give out to them.For me when I see this door for the deaf, where they can be as normal as me, I wish every deaf child and the parents could walk through it and experience the joy we feel.
I would like to share a little incident that happened y'day. It made me laugh,as well as I had tears at the innocence of it.Prisha had been busy provoking and fighting with her big brother. I always ignore it as I feel it is part of their growing up and also relation building.When it went to far,there was bad behavior, i intervened and since my husband was out, we decided that Prisha needed to left alone till she apologised.The big ego was not allowing her.She sat in the corner and threw a small fit and told me she did not love me and the melodrama was on. When she saw there was no reaction, she sat and was drawing something in her hand.After a while she realised I meant business, she apologised after a lot of tears and ego blasting.I was smiling in my heart as all this is "so cute". She cried a bit and then I told her she needed to have good behavior and then we all love her.I suddenly saw her muttering into her hand "heart, talk to mumma okay, she is a good girl". I just found it so sweet that I could not help but kiss her with tears in my eyes. She had drawn 1 smiling heart in each palm and they belonged to both of us.She told me I should say "I love you to the heart" and kiss it to make up, which I gladly did. I love this child innocence and wish it never goes away.

Our chat with the ENT specialist

Today we got prisha's dressing changed. The boil looks better and has reduced quite a bit. The wound has healed but needed to be covered for another day. I hope the bulge would go away soon.She still gets scared the moment we enter the nursing home.She has developed a bit of a phobia as far as the incision is concerned. She keeps asking me if he is going to cut her up again.
The ENt specialist turned up to have a look at her ear.He spoke to Prisha and was a bit taken aback. He looked into her ear and said that there was a small boil in her ear but would be ok with the antibiotic medicine. I really hope to see it clear up.He then asked me about her loss. When I told him she was having a profound loss, he asked me if I had done the aided audiogram as this kind was not possible with profound loss.[ he really thought I had no knowledge in this regard and probably did not know that her loss must be mild ] When I told him a few facts , he knew I knew my subject quite well. When I told him my speech therapist name, he looked a bit taken aback again.[All of them know about her but none will recommend her as she is against their mal practices] He told me Prisha's speech shows she was ready for a cochlear implant. i knew that the conversation we were having was leading there. I told him that as I was able to develop speech with HA why opt for a CI. I am happy with it. I have seen the kids who come in our classes. CI have worked but here from what I see in Pune, there have been such cases which give me goose pimples.There is CI , but after that there is hardly any good speech therapy.Resulting in lack of speech.I feel that they should know what they are talking about. Everybody focuses on expensive HA and CI, but with so much poverty in India, and not much help from the government, how can an ordinary man afford them? Why don't they focus on speech therapy. Nobody shows any interest in it. is it because it is not as profitable? I feel I am more educated about the subject than any of these degree and diploma holders in this field.I was able to talk about it to the doctor and he was so uncomfortable and quickly wrapped me up from the room.Let us work towards the benefit of the masses. India is big and I know how difficult it is for an ordinary man to understand this subject and also to put together enough money to buy aids.Can't we promote AVT and help people to develop speech with whatever aids they can afford? I am glad today I educated the doctor and showed him a larger picture.Let us not be selfish and work a little more for the society. Just because CI has more scope to make money, one educates himself quickly on that subject, and when we talk about speech therapy , they look elsewhere. I am glad that I am able to show these people that with good HA too we can develop speech and give answers to their questions but when will the answers come for the questions of the common man?When will AVT take over and every deaf child talk? I hope soon.

ASL verses AVT

I have come across this discussion of ASL verses AVT lately.A pediatrician cousin working in US had a discussion with my teacher , Mrs Alaka Hudlikar, also wanted to see how AVT is preferred to ASL. Well after the discussion she too came to the conclusion that AVT is definitely the best way to integrate the deaf child to normal life in the early intervention programme.She says that 99 % of the deaf kids have parents who can hear.They have no clue of the sign language. If they diagnose early , and fit with hearing aids that suit them , next comes language development. To teach the child sign language , the parents first have to learn it as with little kids, they spend maximum time with the mothers.To learn any new language , be it sign or french ,German etc , it would take minimum 2 -3 years to perfect it and then you need people who would communicate with you in that language to practice it.In that time , 2-3 years of precious , formative years of the child's life when he develops language go wasted.The mother tongue of the family needs no time and as soon as the aids are put the mother can talk to the child under the guidance of a speech therapist to help the child to develop speech and language.Moreover in the last 40 years of her taking speech therapy classes, there is not a single mother who has come and told her that she would like her child to learn to sign.ALL mothers say just one thing, teach my child to talk, I want to hear his voice, I want him to call me " mummy".All the mothers are ready to do anything to hear their child talk. More over in my entire life ,had it not been for Prisha, I would not have met so many deaf people.How many people on the road and public places know sign language? Are we not limiting their world? They need to be with someone all time to help them decipher to other people what they want to communicate. Today if somebody asked me about it , I would never want her to sign.I love to hear her sing and speak.Had it not been for AVT , I would have been deprived of this pleasure.I would be afraid to leave her alone all by herself.Today she leads a very normal life like any other normal kid. There are normal kids who only have one language, deaf also can do with one language.If I go to south India, I manage with English, I don't learn the local language of all the places I visit. Once one language is learnt, the deaf too can pick up 2nd or 3rd language if they want. Prisha is picking up Hindi, thanks to this programme. There is difference between my normal son and her.There is a child in ma'am's class who has picked up 4 languages.The method is the same, teach the child to listen and speak. Once they learn to reproduce the sounds they hear, they can learn any language. So I really feel , in the early intervention programme, the child's best option is AVT. If diagnosed later than 10 years, then yes, sign language is a better option.

Class name

Prisha really got me on my nerves today.......Mrs.Hudlikar asked her a particular bird in the page of birds.She immediately said "peacock".We insisted on the full sentence and she did.Then her next question was "what is a peacock?" The kids looked blank.I was horrified.Damn it Prisha , we have talked about it so many times.Ma'am gave hints like...."Is it a flower?.....Is it an animal? ugh..no reaction.The bulb would not glow.I was fretting sitting behind her.Then finally she told them it was a bird.I need to work on the class name.There is never enough .I teach and she forgets.
Another important thing she spoke about was-reporting speech.She said ask her to report things to others.Eg, what did the teacher tell her in school.Teacher told me that I was a good girl.Or what did daddy say to uncle?Daddy told uncle to hurry up.It is important as not always do we talk directly.We speak in reporting speech.I have used it with Prisha and so it is not difficult but I need to make it more often so that she learns to listen to conversation around her and will integrate better as she will be more alert about talks around her which normal people unconsciously hear.The deaf children often feel left out in the normal conversations, whispers around which cuts them off from people.

Interesting reading

http://cochlearimplantonline.com/blog/?p=270#comment-5808

Very good reading!!

To You, My Sistersby Maureen K. Higgins -

Many of you I have never even met face to face, butI've searched you out every day. I've looked for youon the Internet, on playgrounds and in grocery stores.I've become an expert at identifying you. You are wellworn. You are stronger than you ever wanted to be.Your words ring experience, experience you culled withyour very heart and soul. You are compassionate beyondthe expectations of this world. You are my "sisters."Yes, you and I, my friend, are sisters in a sorority.A very elite sorority. We are special. Just like anyother sorority, we were chosen to be members. Some ofus were invited to join immediately, some not formonths or even years. Some of us even tried to refusemembership, but to no avail.We were initiated in neurologist' s offices and NICUs, in obstetrician' s offices, in emergency rooms,and during ultrasounds. We were initiated with sombertelephone calls, consultations, evaluations, bloodtests, x-rays, MRI films, and heart surgeries.All of us have one thing in common. One day thingswere fine. We were pregnant, or we had just givenbirth, or we were nursing our newborn, or we wereplaying with our toddler. Yes, one minute everythingwas fine. Then, whether it happened in an instant, asit often does, or over the course of a few weeks ormonths, our entire lives changed. Something wasn'tquite right. Then we found ourselves mothers ofchildren with special needs.We are united, we sisters, regardless of the diversityof our children's special needs. Some of our childrenundergo chemotherapy. Some need respirators andventilators. Some are unable to talk, some are unableto walk. Some eat through feeding tubes. Some live ina different world. We do not discriminate againstthose mothers whose children's needs are not as"special" as our child's. We have mutual respect andempathy for all the women who walk in our shoes.We are knowledgeable. We have educated ourselves withwhatever materials we could find. We know "the"specialists in the field. We know "the" neurologists,"the" hospitals, "the" wonder drugs, "the" treatments.We know "the" tests that need to be done, we know"the" degenerative and progressive diseases and wehold our breath while our children are tested forthem. Without formal education, we could become boardcertified in neurology, endocrinology, and psychology.We have taken on our insurance companies and schoolboards to get what our children need to survive, andto flourish. We have prevailed upon the State toinclude augmentative communication devices in specialeducation classes and mainstream schools for ourchildren with cerebral palsy. We have labored to proveto insurance companies the medical necessity of gaittrainers and other adaptive equipment for our childrenwith spinal cord defects. We have sued municipalitiesto have our children properly classified so they couldreceive education and evaluation commensurate withtheir diagnosis. We have learned to deal with the restof the world, even if that means walking away from it.We have tolerated scorn in supermarkets during"tantrums" and gritted our teeth while discipline wasadvocated by the person behind us on line. We havetolerated inane suggestions and home remedies fromwell-meaning strangers. We have tolerated mothers ofchildren without special needs complaining aboutchicken pox and ear infections. We have learned thatmany of our closest friends can't understand what it'slike to be in our sorority, and don't even want totry.We have our own personal copies of Emily PerlKingsley's "A Trip To Holland " and Erma Bombeck's "TheSpecial Mother". We keep them by our bedside and readand reread them during our toughest hours. We havecoped with holidays. We have found ways to get ourphysically handicapped children to the neighbors'front doors on Halloween, and we have found ways tohelp our deaf children form the words, "trick ortreat." We have accepted that our children withsensory dysfunction will never wear velvet or lace onChristmas. We have painted a canvas of lights and ablazing Yule log with our words for our blindchildren. We have pureed turkey on Thanksgiving. Wehave bought white chocolate bunnies for Easter. Andall the while, we have tried to create a festiveatmosphere for the rest of our family. We've gotten upevery morning since our journey began wondering howwe'd make it through another day, and gone to bedevery evening not sure how we did it.We've mourned the fact that we never got to relax andsip red wine in Italy . We've mourned the fact that ourtrip to Holland has required much more baggage than weever imagined when we first visited the travel agent.And we've mourned because we left for the airportwithout most of the things we needed for the trip.But we, sisters, we keep the faith always. We neverstop believing. Our love for our special children andour belief in all that they will achieve in life knowsno bounds. We dream of them scoring touchdowns andextra points and home runs.We visualize them running sprints and marathons. Wedream of them planting vegetable seeds, riding horsesand chopping down trees. We hear their angelic voicessinging Christmas carols. We see their palettessmeared with watercolors, and their fingers flyingover ivory keys in a concert hall. We are amazed atthe grace of their pirouettes. We never, never stopbelieving in all they will accomplish as they passthrough this world.But in the meantime, my sisters, the most importantthing we do, is hold tight to their little hands astogether, we special mothers and our special children,reach for the stars.

I found it on Learn2hear@yahoogroups.com and thought I needed to share it with others too.

Tantrum control

Thank God, today I realised that by not giving in to her tantrum in class that day she has understood FOR NOW, that mom is not giving in to her without a reason.It was very tempting for me that day to actually accept her illogical demand where I knew what she wanted was wrong, and to have my peace of mind by giving in.At least I would not have a high blood pressure, a headache and the frustration.By not giving in that day and by showing her that I was not affected by her crying ,a point has been put across .It is in the long run for her benefit.For the momentary peace ,a wrong input was not encouraged.This morning I saw another tantrum coming, and I nipped it by warning her that I DON'T WANT ANOTHER TANTRUM.We spoke sitting across and it died a natural death.
I feel that this has to be instilled right from the birth of the child.The child needs constant attention and soon the child realises that all my moods affect people around me and specially my mom.So to get attention he starts to ,in his own little ways, get the situation under his control.In a typical scene at home,I noticed the moment I am on the phone or talking with the neighbour or am in a public place the child would ask for a thing which normally a mom would say no to.A bit of whining and mom givings in and a wrong message has been instilled and encouraged.I as a mom will have to sit and understand that the demand is ok to go with, or it is something you would not want to give in to.If you find the demand is something that is not be fulfilled then at no cost should we give in.By being firm on it ,after explaining the reason for it, we have driven a point in.If the child still insists a bit of tantrum would come in but we should not budge and still be firm on the decision.The reason has to be given, maintain your cool and by not loosing your head the child would after all the crying, would stop.It is important that when the child comes around ,do not melt till he has understood the reason for your denial and apologised.I remind her of the tantrum and that I am not giving in when the next one comes.I have realised I have sat down with my older son as a kid when we had an issue.I used a lot of words and explained sitting across.As a result he learnt to listen to my logic and is more receptive.We need to spend a lot of energy and our vocal chords from the beginning so the child is clear from the beginning.We tend to confuse the child by giving in sometimes at a wrong thing and sometimes being adamant.We have to consistent , for that a lot of patience is required but motherhood is not easy.We have a child's development in our hands.

Also with hearing impaired children people have this"o ,the poor child" syndrome.THE CHILD IS NOT SICK.we are pampering him.We tend to do everything for him.The family too also tends to have this poor thing attitude.Do not allow it.The deaf child learns to use it his advantage, in school, home and all places.They have to be given that much language .I see it as a speech therapy session.I by using the language ,intonation and expression am able to get across a hearing impaired child.We feel it is difficult and straining to speak to a deaf child and so let go off the tantrum.I remember one thing ....After she wears hearing aids , SHE IS NOT DEAF.She like any normal child and so it becomes easy to talk to her and give her the language.The bottomline is -Do not confuse the child , be consistent.

Awareness

It is amazing that in this age of communication and technology , how 'sign language' is still so popular.Why is it that we are not not making people aware that children are talking?They can be integrated into normal life with absolutely no use of sign language and lip reading.Why are the audiologist not spending their energy and resources into bringing in "AVT"?Auditory verbal therapy has given my daughter and my family a fresh lease of life.When I hear of sign language I shudder to think of how I would have lost the chance of hearing my pretty daughter's voice and her singing. We do not feel her hearing impairment many times.Her speech is clearing and her thoughts come out in her own language without my prompting.I do correct her when she does not get her thoughts right at times though.
Y'day my teacher had gone to a child welfare association's programme for the handicap.She was so disappointed as all they did was put up programmes by the DEAF AND DUMB kids.Yes it is encouraging them and motivating them to live , but are we not restricting their life by giving them "sign language'?Do they not deserve to live a normal life? Today they are in the care of the centre and are able to manage within the protected environment of centre, home and family.But what happens tommorow when they are adults and have to lead an independent life?How many normal people will understand them?How many will pity them, isolate them as it is a botheration to understand and make yourself understand and actually will they not feel "different and handicapped"?Why are we not working towards getting them to be accepted by making the effort.If their are people who are talking and their is a technique to make them hear and talk and understand , why are the audiologist still not working on that.Why are we still cochlear implanting people when people like my teacher are making deaf children talk despite their profound loss of hearing and that too with ordinary hearing aids?Are we not still encouraging the old system when we are able to through internet find out all the information.Through blogging and "youtube" I have listened to so many children talk and sing.
People wake up.We need to integrate the deaf people into normal lives.Do not make them 'different' and isolate them by giving them a different language as how many people would have to learn their language in order to let them be independent and make them feel normal. Let us empower them by giving them the language of the masses.Once they understand the language of the masses they are no longer DEAF AND DUMB, they are not even DEAF, they are just hearing impaired as good hearing aids have given them the power to hear and AVT has given them the power to understand and speak.They are just left with a condition of 'hearing impairment', they are no longer HANDICAPPED.
I want to share an incident that one of the moms of hearing impaired told us.Her teenage daughter was told to take part in a drawing competition in the handicapped category.Promptly the gutsy girl replied 'I am not a handicapped person, I can hear and understand and speak everything so why are you putting me in that category?'Hats off and what an inspiring tale.Irony is why should a hearing impaired child be in the first place be put in a handicapped category for a drawing competition.Their hands and feet are all ok and they can draw using their fingers. I am glad that that girl does not think she is a handicapped person.
The down side of this is that such children go to normal schools and so are not aware and are not able to avail a lot of aid given to deaf and dumb children.The institutions for such children put up shows like this and all the government aids go to such institutions and not always does it go to the deserving people.I wish their was more empathy and tranceparency in India.

A touch of stardom

This 27th Oct was very exciting for me.I got a call from a women's magazine as they liked the article I sent to them about my journey with my daughter.They did a photoshoot at my place.I was so overwhelmed.I rushed to put my wordrobe ready according to what they wanted.They were 8 of them- a makeup artist, a hairdresser, photographer and the local edition editor and others.I felt like a star as they put the make up and clothes and hair for shoot.Both of us posed around and it was quite an experience.I looked so different.It was like being myself 15 yrs back when dressing up was a second nature to me.After marriage and kids I had lost myself somewhere and last 3 years specially had taken a toll on me.I really hope I am able to at least reach out to some people and help out.Thanks to my little girl I am learning to come around and I have a purpose.

I had gone for her school PTA and the teachers complimented me on the job I was doing.She was nervous when she realised a deaf child was in her class.But she feels she has no problem with her and she answers everything and does not feel there is any problem. The 3 years that I put in have made her integration in school easy.

The First Post

This is a blog about a mother's journey with a hearing impaired child.

I intend to cover what I learned about hearing impairment, auditory verbal training, etc., so that this becomes a resource for others.

More to come later.